Are you sick and tired of the drama and manipulation of the ego game?
We all play the ego game in one form or another.
The salesman will appeal to your vanity. “This looks so good on you….” “A beautiful woman like you needs this…” “A man like you will look good behind the wheel…
The needy friend who wants your constant reminders will beg you to confirm your devotion. “Are you really my friend?” “Would a friend act like this?”
Some women get this all the time. “You are just so hot, beautiful, sweet, nice,etc. (translation- I just want to get in your pants and you better respond to me or you’re a bitch)
But some men who have their own esteem can see this from a mile away also. I say, don’t manipulate me if it’s not without strings. Don’t make nice because you want me in your club, on your side or to be your ego cheerleader. In my mind a compliment is a compliment but I can also find an authentic one for just about anyone. My ego can’t but my true self can.
If I say something about you whether it be noticeable or not, you can rest assured it’s not because I am “being nice”. If I extend a compliment to you it’s honest and I expect nothing from you. In fact I hate the former type of nice because it’s suffocating to my authentic nature.
My own understanding of “the ego/self” is that it has no substance and must be propped up constantly. And only that which has no existence fears non existence and must be stroked, coddled or cajoled. An existential thing just is. It is the thing that is offended, hurt, outraged by imaginations, holds grudges, keeps score and is dependent on a winner and a loser. My aim is to leave it like a monkey suit by the side of the road along with the drama. Of course I’m a work in progress. What’s your take? Dive in the water’s fine….deep but fine
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63 Answers
Are we in a bad mood today?
While I tend to agree with some of the points you’ve raised, ‘ego’ as you’ve put it, is unavoidable. Everything we do is for self-gain. It’s nearly impossible for the general ‘brain’ model to function otherwise.
Also, are you alright?
Yes, I hate it. But I see no alternative. I can only control my own actions and reactions to what others may do or say.
It’s bad a bad sales tactic to use this on people anymore. We’ve grown sophisticated enough to usually see past it. Playing on people’s insecurities still seems to work, though. I’m not really a fan of either approach. I’m a nice guy at heart, but women respond better to me when I’m stand-offish.
Haven’t you heard. Fear is the new praise. Much more effective.
have i ever told you what a handsome man you are?
Ego’s not the enemy, it’s just not the whole story. Even trying to leave it behind is giving it too much credit, really. All that drama and manipulation, all that jousting and seduction and wheedling, is not something other than your true nature. See that , and none of it is a problem.
The secrets to being free from the “Ego Game” are:
1. Know yourself. Build a portfolio of varied experiences. Test yourself against aspects of your enviornment until you know what you can and cannot do.
2. Learn to not want. Desire for wealth, material posessions, untramelled sex, etc., fuels ego.
3. Strive for balance in all things.
@Judi
No. And yes it does have the feel of a cold shower I agree. It’s quite bristling at first but invigorating and very healthy.
@daemonelson
I disagree with the former and yes to the latter.
@Miles
Either approach works on the same tendency of behavior.
@Poopy
The superego is the culmination of the ego’s position yes but there’s more which is emancipation from it.
@Blondesjon
No but I heard it from your wife.I have to add some yeast to this loaf :)
@Harp
True but you’re bringing too much of your own into this. There’s no drama, wheedling or manipulation in leaving it behind. It’s just dropped.
@ChazMaz
I disagree
@CaptainHarley
Good points…but that is the ego’s position itself. It seeks reassurance and constancy in all things to assure it’s non existent position.
Thats just the way human beings are. To get by we manipulate and use others especially when it comes to our ego. Yes I totally understand your disgust and anger at this sometimes because I feel it too but that is something that we all have to face. Only until we all reach in that place where we are all equal in paradise then will we have the soloution to that problem.
@ SeventhSense I have spent the last four months studying Freud. I completely agree with his take.
@Poopy
Spend another 20 years and you’ll crack the surface.
Especially in money, politics and religion.
Right? I mean Jim Kramer, Jim Baker, Jim Gaffigan…it’s all 99% bullshit.
@ SeventhSense no flippin’ way, four months is to long
Do we have the courage to trust after experience from people like this?
@Poopy
Well even at this point you see it leads to a wall eventually.
In all things the same- the Televangelist who builds his empire of greed only to be inseparable from degradation, the trader who creates paper castles that are corrupt, the screen idol whose beauty decays.
No one wants to imagine the gig being up. No one wants to imagine there can be more. The reason why is that the ego is monumentally threatened by this topic. The fear is the absence of life which is not possible. The absence of self is quite possible because it has no existence. Raise the issue and watch the sparks.
In relation to the televangelist, we should not worry about the gig but the message that is being brought across.
@cornbird
The gig is the message. The words are window dressing.
Not necessarily. Sometimes there is no gig involved but only ways in which to spread the truth, but we are so worried about the gig that we dont listen well to the message…..
@ SeventhSense very insightful, makes me stop and ponder. thank you
Your original face before your parents were born..
What about when Jesus came to give us a message. Did he have a gig involved?
@Harp
The imagination of self
And yes of course it’s impossible not to talk about the topic of ego without the ego being involved but to imagine there’s is just a letting go of it is a very subtle game of ego as well. It hides in two ways. The first is the primary idea about the nature of ego and that is the base/brash in your face and the other being if I’ am very still they won’t notice me and I can maintain my position in the equation As long as you imagine there is a me here and a you there it is still at work. It does not just lay down. It hides
And yet, I’m here and you’re there. Can you see that?
That I don’t have supersonic vision?
Sorry, I have to go wash my dog now.
<—-does the chicken dance
Are there none willing to enter into dharma combat?
Spits @Harp
@SeventhSense… that’s what ego IS: a constant demand for more; more attention, more things, more money, more sex, more of everything.
@CaptainHarley
You’re speaking in circles. Of course it’s ego. The only thing that can dismantle the ego is the drive of the ego. Do you think there is no violence it sitting on the cushion?
The aim is to eviscerate it and the only means to do that is to flush it out like a rat from its hole
No. No! It never gets old. More stuff, more adulation, more sex! I am, however, sufficiently altruistic to relieve you of your possessions if they are binding you to your ego.
Ego cannot defeat ego. That’s oxymoronic.
@CaptainHarley
Ironic but not oxymoronic
Crazy Wisdom because the nature of the ego is not logical.
Spiritual Materialism is the height of ego. It can’t be touched because it’s “HOLY”. It can’t be questioned because “IT“S NICE”. It’s the most dangerous thing on earth.
Notice the first answer.
Ego is not a thing to be totally destroyed, only diminished in force and effect. This is accomplished by the denial of ego’s demands… a learning to not want, the diminution of self.
You must realize prajna to liberate yourself from the cycle of birth and death. In order to realize the prajna of ultimate reality, you must penetratingly comprehend the principle that the nature of all things is originally empty. You must know the impermanent nature of all things. You must know that all worldly phenomena are illusory, empty and false like dreams, illusions, bubbles and shadows. Prajna is sometimes called understanding, knowledge, wisdom, or insight. It is an intuitive wisdom that cannot be conveyed by concepts. It is insight into emptiness, which is the true nature of reality. It is a Sanskrit word for wisdom that basically means purifying insight into emptiness—the true nature of reality.
Wow, what a great question. You must be really smart to think of a question like that. I like the way you wrote it, too, all serious-like.
And you sure are having a good hair day today.
The ego game is spackle for the soul. Ego is just another way to attempt to cover up the blemishes of our shortcomings and offers tremendous entertainment value when in the presence of a died in the wool egotist.
Pointless circles. The ego is all and nothing. It is and it is not. Finito.
People think the ego is all about dicks like me. But the ego is far beyond dicks like me and that’s what I’m driving at. It’s all in the imagination.
Ego over’t’thuh liquor store. Ego wid me to da honkytonk dancehall. Ego find him sum wimin. Ego home wid one o dem wimin and I went home alone. Some ego, huh?
No, not at all. I think it is through stregthening our conscious control over our environment that we can evolve beyond our animal nature, and become fully human. What you see as drama and manipulation are actually the ‘practice’ or ‘exercises’ we all need to become the best human we can possibly be. To me, it is similar to the toddler taking a few steps, falling, and eventually coming to walk upright.
I need to apologize publicly for my first post. I was having a stressful day and the question was so deep it kind of overwhelmed me. If I wasn’t willing to give a thoughtful answer I should have skipped the question instead of making a smart ass remark. my apologies @SeventhSense for belittling a serious question. Not cool of me, and I hope out of character for me.
Judi is of course quite gracious but I attempt to achieve something that is not possible in this venue and maybe it’s an overambitious resolve. It’s best directed within.
Yes, I live for the day when Political Correctness dies a horrible death. When people say what they mean, mean what they say, tempered only with that little known commodity common courtesy.
You betcha! Sorry, out of the loop
@Ghost_in_the_system
No honesty and common sense are grave offenses to the PC crowd. I’m convinced we were better off in the 1940’s.
From the reading and elderly I’ve met. These men and women saved the world from the brink of destruction in WW2. There was no bullshit. Men were strong. Women were strong. Life was real, movies were entertainment with happy endings and it was enough to work hard and be honest. They truly were/are the greatest generation.
@SeventhSense sure, If being Jewish or Negro didn’t keep you from getting a job, or you didn’t mind being called ni@g@r or being “jewed down” or “Indian giver” was not deameaning, or you could be arrested for being a “spic” in a public park. Sometime PC means being sensitive to the discrimination power of wordsI
True but we can’t throw out the baby with the bath water.
@SeventhSense Words are a powerful force, and should not be misused.
@Harp
Ego’s not the enemy, it’s just not the whole story. Even trying to leave it behind is giving it too much credit, really. All that drama and manipulation, all that jousting and seduction and wheedling, is not something other than your true nature. See that , and none of it is a problem.
Probably the best answer because I’m compelled to strangle you with your harp strings which would probably only create sweet music ringing in my ears to torment me further
I’m not afraid of ego but have learned to prioritize what I give attention to and then figure out what’s driving the need for reassurance or want. The people who matter to me, I try to pay attention to what sets them off and then address those things to a positive outcome or at least an acceptance of things being okay or understandable to where the manipulations can back off. I keep hope my peops give me the same patience and effort.
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